Sweet dreams

Tonight, Paul went in to check on Oliver and found him growling and giggling in his sleep. Gosh, I love that little monster.

Elliot 3.0

My snuggly, happy little monkey, you're three years old now and I'm so proud of the little boy that you are becoming.

I love the way you bounce everywhere. When you're happy, your whole body shows it. Your eyes sparkle, your tail wags, your smile stretches from ear to ear. If I could bottle your joy, we'd be set for life.

I love how you've become so communicative at explaining how you feel (like the other day, when you came up and hugged me and told me that you didn't want me to go out without you--no whining, no crying, just communicating, it was a magic moment, my sweetheart).

I love how you've begun to show such compassion and love for your brother. Whenever you hear him wake up, you go running to his bedroom and entertain him until I'm ready to come and get him out of his cot. And when he's upset, you're the first one to come over to him and say, "It's okay, Oliver". You're even beginning to share your toys with him and show some patience when he messes with the ones you're playing with.

I love how your imagination has blossomed. Whenever I pretend I'm not paying attention, I overhear you making up the best scenarios with your toys, stories about lions and monsters and dragons blowing out fire and always there's an Elliot and a Mommy in your play story (and most the time a Daddy and Oliver too) and always they're looking after each other which makes me so so happy.

I also love how you've started to sing all the time. In the back of the car, in your room during nap/rest time, when you're playing by yourself, you'll just start singing. And the library of songs that you've got stored in that impressive little brain of yours is something pretty amazing.

I love how mostly you want to be a big boy and learn how to do all sorts of really grown up stuff all by yourself, but sometimes you still want to be carried or cuddled or fed just like a 'little baby boy'. Y'know what? Mostly, I love that you're becoming grown up and want do stuff all by yourself, but sometimes I still want to have my little baby boy back too.

I love how your magnetic personality shines and how you love to perform and say "Look at me!!! Look at me!!!" I don't know if you'll be in the circus performing all the tricks we practice together, or become a stand-up comedian (I still wonder if I got my funny from you or if you got your funny from me, but I love how you amuse yourself just like I amuse me) or an academy award winning actor (you're dramatic skills have been really getting refined these days--we've had to tell you the story about the boy who cried wolf more than once recently) but I do know that whatever path you choose in life, it won't be one where you'll be hiding in the shadows.

Sure sometimes you get a little bit sooky and over-dramatic or throw a very impressive tantrum, but mostly we see how hard you're trying to be a good boy and it makes me really really proud to be your mom. (And when I tell you how proud I am of you, there is nothing better than seeing you beam with self-pride.)

I LOVE YOU, ELLIOT!

Why Daddy's are so good to have around . . .

Not only does Daddy do really awesome things like make me a tire swing . . .

 

. . . and mow roads into the front yard so Ollie and I can push our dump trucks around . . . and help me create a fabulous glow-in-the-dark outfit for Nacho

 

. . . but he also says really funny things like, "I wonder how big you'd have to be to poo a dinosaur." You gotta love him. ~ Elliot

Midnight Double Feature Picture Show

Last night, my gorgeous, clever, and super funny nieces and I ventured out for a midnight showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show at the outdoor cinemas. Although it was their first public viewing of the flick, Rebeka and Rhiannon knew a thing or two more about the movie than I did when I first lost my RHPS virginity.

They knew all about what to do/say/throw at all the appropriate times of the movie, AND they dressed up and looked AWESOME! And I felt a bit LAME and OLD for deciding not to join them in dressing up. Next time, I'll be Riff-Raff, I swear!

Thank so much Rebeka and Rhiannon for a super fun night. I'm not sure what it is about you two, but I always find myself giggling like an idiot when I'm around you. It's a very good thing!

My Messy Mess Birthday Party

WOWZER!! Did Mommy and Daddy ever throw me a fun and memorable 3rd birthday party!! They decided that the party should be one in which 3-year-olds get to do what they love to do most: make a big messy mess!

But before the party we had lots of preparations to do, and I couldn't let Mommy and Daddy do it all by themselves. I helped Mommy and Daddy choose all the party supplies like the decorations and Pass the Parcel gifts and even the goodies for the lolly bags, which Mommy called (un)lolly bags because she's a fuddyduddy and doesn't think little kids should be eating lots of sugar. Whatever Mommy! But we did get some good stuff for my friends like curly straws and bubbles and party-sized Play-Dohs. And she did relent and allow me to choose a couple of gummy snakes and candies to put in my friends' bags.

And then we had lots of cooking to do. I stirred the cupcake mix and added the food colouring to make them yellow and blue. And I cut the finger Jello into all sorts of shapes with my cookie cutters. And best of all, I helped Mommy to make the frosting and decorate my birthday cake. It was both of our first times using an actual frosting bag thingie and Mommy thought we did a great job! What do you think?

Just like a pro!

And then it was time for the party! Mommy greeted all my friends and styled them up with with some blue and purple hairspray so they'd get into the messy spirit right away. She also gave some of the older kids cans of silly string, and they had a blast running around spraying us all. As for us littler kids, we dove right into the messy mess with body painting.

Bradley contemplates the colours

James wants to join in the fun

Elizabeth shows off her artistic talent

Once we were all thoroughly painted, Mommy brought out the cupcakes and frosting and marshmallows and sprinkles, and we all had a great time decorating our own cupcakes, then licking off all the frosting and goodies and decorating them again.

Is there any cupcake under all the frosting, marshmallows and sprinkles?

Regan, Xander, Elizabeth, Cailey and I waiting for the frosting

Tim shows off his creations

Elizabeth sprinkles with the utmost care

After all that sugar, it was time for a game of Pass the Parcel. Some of us younger kids weren't exactly sure how to play and just wanted to hold onto the parcel and even start to unwrap it, but the mommies were there to make sure we kept passing it along until the music stopped and then whoever was holding it could unwrap a layer and uncover a pressie. Mommy got so carried away with all the layers of presents that some of us even got two of them.

Reuben showing me how this game works

Zach and Lachlan checking out the goods

Look at me! I'm three!

Ben unwraps with care

Regan 'helping' me unwrap the parcel

Then after a bit of playing and running amok, Mommy brought out our masterpiece of a cake so that we could all sing me Happy Birthday and take turns blowing out the candles (that was Mommy's idea because Cailey and Elizabeth kept blowing out the candles before I could!)

Happy Birthday to me!

Cailey clearly awed by our beautiful cake

After more licking off of frosting, it was time for the messiest of our messy messes. Some folks call it 'goo' and some call it 'slime', but I call it F-U-N. And I think Mommy and Sam and the big kids had as much fun as any of us. Before long, it was in our hair, on our clothes, everywhere! So Daddy got the sprinklers going for all of us littlies to run around in until all the slime washed off.

Blake, Wil, Tiana, Cailey, Ryder, Regan and I getting into the slime

So messy and so much fun!

Mommy sharing some slime with Ollie

And Elizabeth 'sharing' some slime with Sam

Once we were all clean and dry, Mommy handed out the (un)lolly bags and we all sat around and compared our goodies.

Ryder, Zach, Brad, Tim and I checking out the lolly bags

You can probably tell from the pictures that we had a pretty great time. All the kids ran and played until the sugar high fizzled out and we were all very tired. Then it was time to say good-bye to my friends, have a bath and settle down in front of one of my new movies while Mommy and Daddy started cleaning up all that messy mess. ~ Elliot

Thanks Mommy and Daddy for an awesome party!

Xander keeping nice and tidy

Blake and Wil wielding the silly string and rocking to the music

Reuben cleaning the slime off the seesaw

Oliver and Lachlan comparing notes about their upcoming birthday parties

Rob and Sam on towel duty

Daddy, Blake and Wil hanging out

Bali Escape

A week ago today this little mama was just touching down back in Perth after a few childless responsibility-free days of Bali bliss. Yep, I jet-setted my lucky self off to paradise for a long weekend to catch up with one of my oldest friends (well Cara's not old--we've just known each other forever) and her lovely husband, Chris who were celebrating their 10th anniversary.

It was heaven. But it wasn't all fun and games. Nope, because I get so little time just for my own, I decided to make a To Do List to be sure that I made the most of it. And by making the most of my time, I mean doing all the sorts of things that are very hard to do when one is accompanied by two very cute and very energetic little boys for the majority of her days and also the kind of things a person should do when she feels stuck in a bit of a rut and has forgotten what it's like to be adventurous and spontaneous.
I'm happy to report that I successfully completed and ticked all prescribed tasks:

• Eat something I've never eaten:
  snake fruit and frog legs (I didn't really care for either.)
• Do something that scares me:fishy foot spa (It turns out the little fishies felt a lot like little bubbles except when they squiggled between my toes. I didn't like that much.)
• Do things that are difficult to do when I have little boys with me:
  tried stand-up paddle surfing (I totally rode waves standing up!!!), ate at fish shacks on the beach and food stalls at the market (without a thought about hand sanitizer), and smoked from a shisha (apple and grape flavoured tobacco, not anything illicit) while listening to Reggae music on the beach
• Do things that make me happy:
  went for a bike ride, partook in numerous spa treatments (2 full body massages, 1 facial, 1 body scrub, 1 foot reflexology session and the aforementioned fishy foot spa), ate heaps and heaps of fantastic spicy Indonesian food, and spent lots of time reading by the pool and catching up with a good friend.

It was so incredibly therapeutic to get away and do things just for me. But that doesn't mean that I didn't miss my little men horribly. The first day was pretty excruciating, and I even had thoughts about jumping off the plane while we were taxiing for take-off. Those thoughts, however, just seemed to piffer away as I started getting into the swing of my M-E time.

And by the end of the first full day back at home, with the boys inflicting all sorts of pain and revenge on me for leaving them, I was ready to pack my bags and head back to paradise!

Beautiful Bonsai garden

Balinese fisherman

Cara and Chris

Balinese performers

Nibbling on a frog leg

Oh my god! Whose idea was this?!?

Not sure about this!!

Deep breaths. Slow. Deep. Breaths.

Lots and lots of little suckers

Cara and I posing in the hotel garden

One great big bed all to myself where I slept uninterrupted for three whole nights

Our pool in paradise

(Extra big gold star to Cara and Chris for being the first of my friends in the five years we've been in Australia to actually make it down under --or close enough anyway-- for a visit . It was super cool spending time with you and catching up on lots of years of stories and memories. Thanks for inviting me.)

(And EXTRA SUPER DUPER HUGE gold stars to Paul who was stuck at home being a single dad while I was living a life of leisure and luxury. THANKS so much for encouraging me to go.)